Normally our fridge is not this neat or organized, or this clean. We left the country for a month and cleaned our fridge out before we left. So basically we’re starting from scratch again.

Let’s start with the bottom of the fridge. As you can see we have the staples of every Asian household: Kewpie mayo, cabbage, kimchi, and ghetto tupperware using takeout/product containers.

My wife’s current favorite store brand of yogurt.

Japanese pickles galore

Garlic pickled in ume (plum) stored in a gelato container. I usually eat these everyday for lunch.

More pickled stuff, we snuck these past customs.

Contraband kombu, fish preserved in soy sauce.
Tip: If you’re sneaking food back into the country always have a half eaten bag of chips in your bag in case the customs dogs start snooping around.

Ramen and salad greens.

Underneath, more pickles.

These are some of the best ume I’ve ever had.

From the back of the fridge, the good ramen that I do not serve to my guests.

Some cha-shu I made to go with the ramen. I braised pork belly in a top secret Mexican coke-based recipe.

My wife insists that we buy as many types of miso as possible, there’s actually more in the back of the fridge.

My fridge door is full of Japanese salad dressings, Thai, Korean, Jamaican, Chinese, Indian, and Japanese seasonings.

I bought this on impluse from Fairway and was surprised how great this stuff is. Usually buying ethnic products at a American supermarket is a bad idea.

My favorite ingredient. I’m still working on the perfect demiglace beef stew.

On to the freezer. As you can see there’s lots of freezer bags.

We eat too much ice cream.
These shrimp have to go

This fish head has to go too.

Whenever there’s a sale on Japanese unagi (eel)at Mitsuwa we load up on these and vaccuum seal em. These are definitely a lot better than the chinese stuff.

Hopefully my fridge stays this clean.

What’s hiding out in the back of your fridge? To feature your fridge on UM’s Fridgin’ Out, email umamimart@gmail.com